Technical Standards Policy

All applicants accepted into the Diagnostic Medical Sonography and Echocardiography Programs must be able to meet the program’s technical standards detailed on the following pages. Any information supplied is voluntary and will only be shared with the appropriate college personnel who coordinate or provide support services or accommodations. Hudson Valley Community College’s Center for Access and Assistive Technology will provide accommodations for students with disabilities. Please complete the attached form certifying that you have read, understand and are able to meet these standards.

Technical Standards for Admissions, and Graduation

Technical Standards are non-academic criteria used in the admission, and graduation of students. Technical Standards are published discipline specific essential duties for the safe and reasonable practice of Sonography. They are required for accredited programs through the Joint Review Committee on Education in Diagnostic Medical Sonography (JRC-DMS).

Technical Standards are a concrete statement of the minimum physical sensory/motor, communication, behavioral/social, mental/emotional and environmental requirements for normal and safe professional function. They are intended to inform the prospective student/professional of he attributes, characteristics and abilities essential to the practice of sonography. Professional competency is the summation of many cognitive, affective and psychomotor skills. The College has a moral and ethical responsibility to select, educate and certify competent and safe students and practitioners. Patient health and safety is the sole benchmark against which we measure all performance requirements, including the Technical Standards addressed in this document.

Applicant Certificate of Understanding must be signed on the last page and returned to the Sonography Office. A copy will be made to be kept on file in the Medical Imaging Department Office.

All candidates seeking a certificate through the Diagnostic Medical Sonography and Echocardiography Programs must possess the essential skills and abilities necessary to complete the curriculum successfully with our without reasonable accommodations for any disabilities and individual may have.

Students enrolled in the Hudson Valley Community College Diagnostic Medical Sonography and Echocardiography Programs must demonstrate numerous competencies representing all three learning domains – cognitive, psychomotor and affective. Students learn, practice and verify these competencies in a variety of settings including the classroom, the laboratory and in the clinical environment.

To achieve the mandated classroom competencies, Sonography students must perceive and integrate information from a variety of sources. The sources include oral instruction, printed material, visual media, and live demonstrations. Students must participate in classroom discussion, present oral reports and successfully pass written and computer based examinations which include the interpretation of sonographic images. Completion of these tasks requires cognitive skills including reading, writing and problem solving. To be physically capable of classroom work students must with assistance be able to see, hear, speak, sit and touch.

Sonography laboratory sessions provide students with the opportunity to view and participate in protocol and procedure demonstrations, practice sonography protocols and procedures, acquire skills in sonographic technique development, image development, and patient safety practices. In addition to the cognitive skills necessary in the classroom setting, students must demonstrate fine psychomotor skills to manipulate sonographic transducers, and sonographic equipment. Students must also demonstrate general professional behaviors such as team cooperation and the ability to communicate with others. To satisfy laboratory requirements students must perform all procedures and protocols without critical errors. In addition to the physical capabilities necessary for classroom activities, sonography laboratory sessions require students, with assistance to reach to position and roll patients side to side when necessary, manipulate an ultrasound machine, and transducer while using both hands to perform procedures needed both fine motor skills and considerable strength. The latter procedure includes pushing and pulling an ultrasound machine into position, turning and moving patients, pushing wheelchairs, stretchers and performing cardiopulmonary resuscitation.

Clinical education courses associated the sonography programs involve the application of knowledge and skills learned in the classroom and laboratory setting to actual patients in the clinical environment. Students must be able to obtain medical history from patients, parents or guardian. Deliver, receive, and interpret verbal and non-verbal communication to and from the patient, physician, the clinical personnel instructors and student peers. Students must be able to recognize and react to signs of medical emergencies. Students must record medical history, interpret patient charts and sonographic procedure requests; distinguish audible sounds, visually monitor patients in dimmed lighting, via video monitors, differentiate among the subtle shades of color and gray scale used during sonographic procedures. Students are required to utilize keyboards for clinical data input and for the application of sonographic procedures. Sonographic procedures are performed in a variety of settings including sonographic department rooms, emergency rooms, operating rooms and patient rooms. Performing protocols and procedures in these areas require the student to move briskly between patient care areas, and maintain physical balance while performing examinations on patients of varying body habitus as well as meeting the mental and physical demands in these environments.

Students must demonstrate a respectful and caring attitude toward all patients. They must also demonstrate sensitive responses to patients in the clinical environment and interact with physicians, peers, patients, clinical staff and faculty in an emotionally stable, professional and ethical manner. Respect for diversity among patients, clinical and college personnel and peers must be demonstrated.

For information on services for students with disabilities or if you have a question regarding this information please contact: